On the death of Julius It. in 1513, Michel angelo resumed work on his mausoleum. in ;le eordanee with a second plan on a slightly reduced scab', a pen and ink drawing of which is in the Uffizi. He was thus occupied till 1516; during this time lie executed, at least in part. the most important of the statues intended for it. Fore most of these is the "Moses"—vertainl• the great est colossal statue in modern art. Moses is por trayed at the moment when, enraged at the idolatry of the Israelites, he starts, with threat ening, brow, to quell and crush them. The tech nical execution is perfect. even to such details as the mighty beard, which his hand grasps con vulsively, the nmseular forearm. and the wonder ful fold of drapery upon his knee. The two "Captive Youths" in the Louvre, also termed "Prisoners" and "Slaves." are ideal representa tions of the arts. dying and captive because of the death of their great patriot.i In December. 1516. Michelangelo was com pelled by the wishes of Pope Leo X.. a Medici. to remove to Florence and busy himself with a facade for San Lorenzo. the family church of the He wasted three years of his life in the quarries of Carrara and Pietra Santa procuring the marble for this colossal design, when in 1520 the Pope gave up the plan. Then Cardinal Giulio de' Alediei commanded his servie,•s for the Med i casa n Chapel in the same church. upon which work was begun in 1521. During this period he found time for the "Christ Risen." now in the Church of the \lincrvn, Rome, upon which the finishing touches were put by the sculptor Frizzi —a figure which may justly be termed mannered, since it is rather an athlete than a Christ. Upon Cardinal Medici's elevation to the Papacy as Clement VI!. in 1523, the artist's entire time was taken up by the designs and statues for the Nediewnn Chapel and plans for the Laurentian T.ibrary. This work. however. suns interrupted by the last great struggle of Florence for liberty.
Upon the sack of Rome by the army of Charles V., in 1327, the citizens arose and drove the \Iediri from Florence. Though he had never taken active part in public life. Michelangelo was an ardent patriot. willing to serve his country. On .January 25. 1529. he wns (dingo] one of the nine citizens in charge of the defense of the city. and on April ilth he became governor of the fortifications. His work took him to Pisa and Livorno, and he visited the Duke of Ferrara, the greatest Italian authority on fortifications.
a But convinced that Malatesta Baglioni, the gen eral of the mercenaries, meant to betray Flor ence—as was actually the case—in September, 1520, he fled to Venice. He was received with great honor by the Doge and nobility, but, de clining their hospitality and the invitation cif the King of France to enter his service, he re turned to Florence and resumed his duties on the fortifications. After the capitulation of the city, August 12, 1530, he remained for a time in hid ing, but, on the Pope's invitation and pardon, resumed work on the statues fur the Mediciean Chapel. He had also received a commission from the city for a colossal "Hercules and Cacus," to stand opposite the "David," in commemoration of the expulsion of the :Medici, but he only made the wax model now in South. Kensington Mu seum. A copy of Michelangelo's "Leda and the Swan." a tempera painting executed some time later for the Duke of Ferrara, is at Dresden.
The Chapel of the Medici—the new sacristy of San Lorenzo—is the most important work of its kind in modern art. In sculpture it marks the
culmination of Michelangelo's style. The archi tectural problem was not constructive, but dec orative; and, conceived as a framing for the sculp tures, the architecture is above criticism. The sculptures were only in part executed. On the entrance wall is an incomplete statue of the Ma donna (1522) by Michelangelo, flanked by the patron saints of the Medici, Cosmas by Montor soli, and Damian by Montelupo. Far more lin portant are the tombs of the two Medimean dukes, on opposite sides of the chapel. The dukes are represented over life size, seated above their sar cophagi, and are rather allegorical than portrait statues—the representatives of contemplative and active life. Lo•enzo's head rests heavily on his wrist, and the beaver of his helmet is drawn over his eyes, which gaze on vacancy. Giuliano is represented as the victorious general looking down upon the battle-field. Nothing could ex ceed the technical perfection of his Roman cui rass, and of his hands resting upon the general's staff. At Lorenzo's feet, reclining upon the sar cophagus, are "Dawn" and "Twilight:" at Gin liano's "Day" and "Night." ''Dawn" is the most finished and beautiful of the statues; she starts as if from a dream, her face full of despondency. In "Night," a sleeping woman of magnificent physique, the sculptor has solved the difficult problem of a reclining figure in profile. "Twi light" and "Day" are male figures of Herculean proportions, the heads of which are unfinished. "Day," the grander of the two, is represented as gazing over his shoulder, showing treatment of the muscles of the back in this difficult position. In reality, these allegories, intended for quite an other purpose, were used by the artist to express his sorrow for the loss of Florentine liberty.
Though chiefly engaged upon the Medieman statues, Michelangelo had also worked at Rome upon the tomb of Julius 11. Luckily he was there when Clement VII. died in 1534. As Duke Alessandro of Florence was bitterly hostile to him, he remained at Rome, residing there until his death. At last he hoped to complete the Mausoleum, which hail been the darling scheme, as well as the bane, of his life. By threats and lawsuits the heirs of Julius II. had imbittered his existence during the reigns of Leo and Clement. but the popes used their power in his behalf, forcing the heirs to repeated changes of contract, each of which reduced the scale of the monument. Paul III. was as unwilling as his predecessors to forego the glory of being served by Michelangelo. He annulled the con tract with the Duke of Urbino, Julius's heir, compelling the latter to make a new one in 1542, according to which the tomb was finally erected •fore 1550. As it now stands in the Church of San Pietro in Vine di, the monument is but a shadow of the artist's great design. The statues adorning the lower part are by Michelangelo himself : the colossal "Moses," and on either side "Active Life" ("Leah") and "Contemplative Life" ("Rachel"). In their present position, which was not the one originally intended, the two female statues are dwarfed by the architectural sur roundings. The statues of the upper story were imperfectly executed, after Michelangelo's de signs, by Montorsoli; the best of them being a Madonna, begun by the designer himself. Four rough-hewn figures in the Poboli Gardens (Flor ence), and an incomplete group of "Victory" in the Museo Nazionale, are supposed to have been parts of the original design of the monument.